So, all of us at Mothership were pretty stoked about and during the Trump-Kim summit.

After all, it’s not every day that Singapore gets to play a part in such a meeting of strongmen.

But with such important beings in the area, security definitely needed to be on high alert.

And to find out how secure, we even made our way down to check out the hotel where Trump and Kim were staying at, and experienced first-hand how tight security was even before the event.

So, you’d think we’d know better.

We had the (un?)fortunate opportunity to experience firsthand just how vigilant the police was, as two of our interns had close brushes with security personnel.

Day 1

As you may recall, we were selling the Trump-Kim t-shirts online in the days leading up to the event.

As we announced the sale rather late because not many people were sure if the summit was even going to happen for real, we did not have the time to arrange for the delivery of the paid for t-shirts to our customers.

Instead, we had to request for our customers to collect them from us.

One of the collection points was in Orchard Ion, and we dutifully stood there and handed over the t-shirts to buyers.

Given that we were on the fringe of the police designated special event area, it wasn't surprising to see increased police activity in the area.

As we held up our t-shirts proudly to get the attention of our customers, we noticed some of the policemen were giving us glances.

However, we reasoned that since we were not actually staging any form of protest, but simply letting our readers collect their orders, we should be in the clear.

Rounded up

As the policemen went about doing their rounds, we were even joking about how the policemen were probably watching us from afar. Ha, what are the chances?

After a while, it became clear that the group of policemen that we kept seeing were, in fact, the same group of policemen.

This means that they have been circling us the entire time. When they finally approached us, I felt a certain amount of dread. After all, getting arrested was not on my schedule for the day.

They explained that they had some questions to ask us, namely about our highly-popular t-shirts. They also requested to talk to us in a more... private place. All this said while forming a human barricade around us.

We were led into a room tucked away near the MRT, hidden from the usual Orchard crowd.

The room looks a lot like the kind of interrogation room you see in movies, complete with white lighting for dramatic effect.

Thankfully, we were were simply asked to sit there while they asked us several questions, which seemed rather normal.

"How many t-shirts did you sell?"

"Where are you selling these t-shirts?"

"Where can I get one of these really cool shirts?"

Hint: one of these questions may not have been asked.

They also asked to take pictures of our t-shirt for recording purposes. Honestly, I can't blame them. Who wouldn't love this amazing shirt?

During this time, we were also asked a variety of different questions, mainly coming back to the number of shirts we sold and the locations we were selling them at.

Some questions were not of the repeat variety though:

"You work at Mothership? Mothership is a real company?"

"I thought it was just four guys tapping on their laptops."

To be fair, that is probably an accurate portrayal of Mothership's early days.

After around an hour, and one last round of questioning, they finally let us go.

It was surprisingly a short affair, though certainly an interesting experience. We also voiced out our understanding that this is a sensitive time, and they were merely doing their jobs.

In fact, after all this, our supervisor said he thought we were playing a prank on him when we said we were being detained.

Like that also can.

Day 2

Foolishly unfazed by the events of the first day, we donned on our t-shirts and went near the St. Regis, hoping to catch a glimpse of Kim’s car as it came back from Capella, Sentosa.

The plan was to capture something for our Instagram page -- the Instagram gods must be appeased.

While most of the area was cordoned off, we walked along the sidewalk opposite the hotel, looking for a good location to position ourselves.

The police in the area immediately took notice of us, and from the corner of our eyes we noticed them observing us.

Déjà vu.

We soon realised that Kim had actually already arrived in the hotel and we weren't going to get our shot. We decided to go back to the office.

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As we moved away from the area, we briefly noticed that the officers walking in the same direction as us. Oh no. Round two.

About four of them caught up with us and said that they needed to ask us some questions. Presumably in order not to cause a scene, they took us to a corner along the junction between Tanglin Road and Nassim Road.

They questions were pretty standard: “What’s your purpose of being here? Where are you from? What do you do at Mothership?”

Accompanied by taking down of our details and a lot of calls made.

The police personnel became quite a bit more firm. Also more and more police cars came to where we were. At one point, there was probably four vehicles and about seven or eight personnel around us.

Like the previous day, they asked to take a photo of our t-shirt. This time, three different officers took three different photos of the t-shirt — front and back.

As we were waiting, one of the plainclothes officer asked us what we were doing there:

What were you guys intending to do there?

“Oh, we just wanted to take a video for our Instagram page.”

I could almost sense the groan the officer was trying to suppress.

At one point, we probably attracted the attention of some of the media and reporters in the area, as they casually walked around us trying to get pictures and a sense of what happened.

Probably the closest I’d ever get to being a celebrity stalked by paparazzi.

All this time, the police were firm, but polite, and strangely somewhat reassuring. They were nice enough to seek our understanding and briefly explain they needed more time.

It was only about 30 minutes later they said we were free to go. They reminded us not to hold any protests or placards in the area, which we reassured them that the t-shirt was not political whatsoever.

The officer in-charge said: “This area need to be more sensitive la.”

Oops.

The burden t-shirt

So yes, our t-shirt was eye-catching enough for us to get detained by the police. Twice.

Or maybe it was just because we were wearing such a cheeky t-shirt in an area with personnel trained to catch out anyone trying to pull a stunt, at a time where security really mattered.

For that, you really have to give our police force. Kudos for such tight security during the period.

So yes, if you ever had any doubts about the vigilance of our men and women in blue, we hope this quells any doubts. Especially at events like this.

Don’t play play.

Now that the summit is over, those who bought the t-shirts can wear them in public anywhere you like without fear or favour.

Top photo adapted from video on Singapore Police Force's Facebook page